A girlfriend of mine was telling me a story last night about how and why her most recent relationship ended. Apparently the guy, who’s a few years younger than she is, freaked out after continuously meeting all her engaged, married, and parenting friends. Since there’s still a “2” before his age and a “3” before his, he felt pressure that she would want to rush into getting married even though she had never said anything of the sort. She explained to me that she tried telling him that she wasn’t in any hurry but he had already made up his mind and broke off the relationship. After a few weeks he came back into the picture ready to listen to what she had to say and admitted that she hadn’t put any pressure on him and now they are cautiously talking again. She sat next to me and told me all this and my response to her was that neither she nor he could rationalize his feelings away and making excuses for the past month wasn’t going to magically change the fact that he freaked out nor was he going to magically not feel any subconscious pressure from dating a woman in her 30’s. I warned her to proceed slowly with her eyes wide open and that in the meantime I would ramp up my efforts to set her up with someone.

People don’t change in a month but they can change over time when they truly want to. Actions speak louder than words so if you are dating someone who hasn’t asked you for Prime Time Date Night within the first few weeks or hasn’t introduced you to his or her family and friends after a few months or refuses to have The Talk after half a year and always has excuses as to why, then stop making excuses for that person and move on to someone who is going to treat you as special as you deserve to be treated.